


hopefully

by Balthuza



Category: Shards of the Sun
Genre: Multi, Self-Doubt, accidental assassinations, assassination by apple pie, gigantic rubies are not a good way to kill people in their sleep, well maybe not so accidental
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-07
Updated: 2017-03-07
Packaged: 2018-09-30 17:05:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10167737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Balthuza/pseuds/Balthuza
Summary: Seeing the ballroom feels like a slap.





	

Seeing the ballroom feels like a slap. The figures frozen in motion, the stone smooth and cold, fill the room, make it seem full, and the absence of life even starker than in her nightmares. For a moment it feels like she's drowning. 

She feels helplessly guilty and restless when faced with the magnitude of her choices’ consequences. 

Then Cosimo manages to thaw one of them and the woman comes back to life. The knot of guilt in Flick’s stomach does not loosen, but feels a bit less cold when the spark of hope appears. 

Maybe someone can fix what she's broken. 

He's drained afterwards and another source of guilt appears. Still, she can't help but be grateful that he managed to find a solution she couldn't. 

Making him a spider is a bit risky, but she does her best to make sure he won't be harmed. It's better to try than to drag him along, half dead on his feet. 

When the idea appeared in her head, back on the crossroads, she felt much more confident. It seemed much simpler there. Now, she's not as certain, having only the faintest idea of a plan, but that never stopped her before. 

Oswald may not talk much about his wife, but Flick can read between the lines well enough. The silence, together with Albany’s words, give her a more-or-less clear picture. It doesn't really matter whether she'll succeed or not - she has to try at the very least. 

The moment of panic when the guard sees her makes her mouth work on instinct, without a thought. If she has to go in and find Ari alone, so be it. After all she won't try to force any of them to murder someone in their sleep, no matter how much she thinks Arianne deserves it. 

She only hopes neither Oswald nor Albany will hold it against her. They'd do the same in her place, she's sure. 

She wanders the long corridor, the soft breathing and murmured prayers the only sounds accompanying her. 

Deciding it'll be a suitable end her, she closes her fingers around a ruby and she can feel the magic seeping into it. 

Ari is fast asleep and Flick gives up on the taunting early, preferring to do what she came here for, and leave. 

The stone slips from her fingers, the magic making it grow to an unreasonable size, sadly just as it is landing on Flick’s foot. 

It takes all her willpower to not cry out, but there's a voice in the back of her head, sounding suspiciously like her mother, repeating a single sentence over and over again: if what you are doing is important, everything else can be set aside. 

Flick balls her hands into fists and liquidifies herself to flow from underneath the boulder. 

It is important. Everything else can be set aside. 

A glimmer of gold catches her eye and she limps towards the safe. She gathers the jewelry with a fluffy towel and decides to give them to Oswald, or maybe use the materials to make something else if he won't take them back. 

She just hopes he won't take it as a reason to go back. 

When she forces the pie into Arianne’s mouth, she feels probably more glad than she should, but when the woman's skin goes black, and becomes ash, and finally she disappears altogether, it feels like she did at least one good thing in this damned palace. 

It's only later when she's writing the letters that the panic starts to set in. She can see just how much she rambles, but she's not particularly good at putting things like this on the paper. 

Hopefully, she'll have a chance to talk to them all soon. 

Hopefully this time she did something good. 

Hopefully she did not misunderstand. If Oswald or Albany were to hate her for what she's done, it may just break her heart a little. 


End file.
